Time On My Hands 12: Epilogue
by Laura W
Summary: On the night of their first Prixin at home, eight months after their return to the Alpha Quadrant, Kathryn and Chakotay share a quiet moment. J/C.


**Note:** This is the final chapter (I swear!) in a post-Endgame epic series that started as a bit of a lark and took on a life of its own. The other 11 parts can be found on my stories page, and should be read in order. This one is just a little vignette to wrap up a loose end. I'm going to rate it R, because even though it's not explicit, there are some happysexyfuntimes going on here. Kathryn and Chakotay deserved this, and they'd waited long enough. :-)

**Time On My Hands 12**

The rest of their story unfolds as if it were already written.

Over the years he will argue that it _was_ already written, that the cosmic Maker spoke their story to the stars on the day the Universe came to be. They had only to be still and listen to the words.

She will counter with a statement in favor of free will, of conscious choices made and adhered to, of the randomness of life and the relentlessness of time.

In the end, she will concede to a certain amount of destiny in their meeting, and he will acknowledge the decisions they made after that meeting. Coming together was an act of fate, but staying together was an act of will. They will agree to disagree.

It's an argument they will have many times in a long life together, softened by the fact that they will usually have it in bed.

In fact, it's where they will have their best, most productive conversations: Tangled in the sheets, listening to the hum of the ship's engines or the night sounds of the planet around them. They will even have these wide-ranging philosophical discussions huddled in a tent in southern Indiana's Deam Wilderness, cozy and warm in a happy pile of blankets and children and dogs.

Wherever they go along their journey, they will carve out a sanctuary just for the two of them where they can talk and laugh and sometimes cry together. They will discuss ship's business lying in bed. They will express pride in the Paris childrens' entry into the Academy. They will coax each other through disappointments and commemorate each others' accomplishments. They will nurse each other through illness, and once, after a horrific shuttle crash, she will sit with him for days while he lies unresponsive – and she will laugh when he finally opens one eye and says, without preamble, "It wasn't my fault."

They will talk through his rage when the Cardassians violate their peace accord and threaten the Federation again, putting his family in danger.

They will mourn the death of her Mother.

They will worry about Tuvok's declining health.

They will celebrate the births of their children and grandchildren – and weep for the one lost to them.

Throughout the years, throughout the triumphs and the tragedies, the arguments and the celebrations, they will find that there is one place in which they can truly be honest with each other, where hurts fall away and only love remains. Even when the discussions are hard, if they can only find a quiet space to be alone together, to wrap themselves around each other in soft darkness, the talking comes easily and the words are never too harsh to bear.

But on _this_ night...this first night...there are no words at all.

After the party, after the crew have dispersed and the little ones have showered them with good-night kisses, they find themselves face-to-face in his room.

She starts to speak, but he stops her lips with his own. He feels they are beyond talking now, and after a few more thwarted attempts at conversation, she silently concedes his point.

He leads her to the window, where they stand side-by-side and watch darkness descend on this joyous, wonder-filled day. When the last rays of the setting sun fade and disappear, a warm light glows from the stained-glass windows of Beck Chapel. The little patches of muted color cast on the fresh snow remind him of the stones in the vase on New Earth. He brushes his fingers across the windowpane.

She catches his hand in her own and kisses his fingertips, then his palm. She realizes that she has always loved his hands, his strong, capable hands – but never more than today when they pulled her close to him with such breathtaking confidence.

In a few minutes, she will revise that opinion and decide she has never loved his hands more than when she trembles under them for the first time.

She'll revise it again in a year when she watches those hands soothe a tearful infant to sleep.

For now, though, she loves the way his hands move through her hair and then come to rest at the nape of her neck. He kisses her again, cradling her head in his palms, and she feels as though her entire being, her very soul, rests in his hands. When he lowers his fingertips to her shoulders, she misses that feeling of safe harbor, of refuge...until his hands slide to her collar, moving it aside.

A few decades from now, in an instant of spirit-crushing grief, he will try to remember what she was wearing at this moment, the texture of the fabric, the sound of it sliding from her body. He will weep when he realizes he has forgotten.

But he will always remember with absolute clarity the glow of her skin in the gathering darkness, and her shudder of pleasure when he touches her for the first time.

The thin, strong line of her collarbone is salty against his tongue, the scent of her desire musky and intoxicating.

He steps away from her and wills himself to slow down. It's taken them almost eight years to get to this moment, and he is desperate to make it last.

When she yanks his sweater over his head and reaches for his trousers, he acknowledges another kind of desperation entirely. He grins when he sees the determination on her face and stills her hands with his own. She looks up and catches his cheerful expression. She hesitates for a second, startled, then gives him a lopsided smile, nods and surrenders.

They tumble together into the gigantic bed that intimidated him and amused her just a few hours ago. She's pleased to find that the mattress is soft and the sheets smooth and inviting, the antique wooden frame sturdy enough to accommodate their play.

And it _is_ play, she realizes. She's always thought their joining would be a mystical and transcendent moment, profound and wondrous. Soon enough it will be; she knows this deep in her bones, as if it has already happened. She's content to wait. Without exchanging a word, together they have decided to make this moment an extension of their laughter-filled day. Transcendence will come later.

There is a brief struggle for dominance.

He decides this is only right and puts up a halfhearted resistance. He allows her to move him to her bidding...but only until need overwhelms his obedience.

When he flips her to her back and covers her body with his own, he chuckles at her small sound of protest. He starts to tell her to give up, but he's the one who decreed that this moment should be silent. Instead he kisses her until she softens beneath him and snakes her arms around his body. Trailing kisses along her cheek, he presses his lips against her ear, then gives it a sloppy lick.

She squirms and laughs out loud.

So does he, when she tickles her fingertips along his ribs.

They come together in a freewheeling tangle of arms and legs, laughter and sighs.

She seizes his ear in her lips, fulfilling a fantasy she's harbored since the first time she saw him pull on it in confusion and uncertainty. His poor ear, so abused over the years. She soothes and nuzzles it and he growls in response.

He kisses her chin, her noble chin, recalling every time she raised it in defiance at a belligerent alien or a wayward lieutenant – or a contrary First Officer. He nibbles along her jawline until he reaches the base of her throat. He presses his nose against her neck and inhales deeply. Her scent is familiar and comforting.

She smooths her hands down his broad back and urges him closer.

He obeys.

Her eyes widen.

He smirks.

She frowns at him, then reaches up, pulls his head down and bites his ear. Not hard, just enough to make him groan and move against her with a bit more urgency.

Seven years of aligning themselves, seven years of being so attuned to each other that they know each others' thoughts and needs without words, come back to them both in a rush. They instinctively move to a comfortable fit, as if they've been lovers for years.

And she realizes with a jolt that they have loved each other like this since the moment they first met. In spite of all the disagreements and struggles, in spite of all odds, they've never stopped.

The lightness of their first moments together falls away and she feels an overwhelming sense of transcendence and joy. She sees it on his face, too, when he pulls back to look at her, and is certain that they have regained the sense of wonder they thought they'd left behind forever.

They both slow and still, wrapped in each other and caught in this sudden revelation.

He curls into her and she rises to meet him, closing the careful distance they have kept between them for so long. In an instant of perfect insight, they both understand that they could never have had this moment without that distance. They had thought that they would need to make up for lost time, but realize that time was never lost to them.

Time was and is their ally, not the undefined and terrifying enemy they thought it was. Every moment of those seven years, both the good and the bad, brought them here. The past takes on new shape and deeper meaning now. And the future holds rightness instead of uncertainty, hope instead of despair, freedom instead of restriction.

And love, so much love.

She allows the joy and wonder of it take her, clutching at her soul companion, her Chakotay.

He feels her ecstasy and loses himself to his spirit mate, his Kathryn.

Gasping, sighing, they remain intertwined even as their bodies soften, reveling in the moment. In times that they cannot be together, in moments of separation and longing to come, they will both recall this feeling of rightness, of a choice made with conviction, of a story already written.

When they are both relaxed again, he rolls to his side and fits her against him. She sighs and pulls the blanket over them. She rests her head on his chest and listens to the rhythm of his strong heart until it lulls her to sleep. He holds her, his face buried in her hair, until he succumbs to exhaustion.

They've never had so much time on their hands.

They will make the most of every moment.

-END-

NOTE: Once again, thanks for reading and reviewing all summer long. I really appreciate it!


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